John Ensign: “Mr. Chairman, while the remarks that the subcommittee chairman said are true, that it is important to have basic science…”

“Mr. Chairman, while the remarks that the subcommittee chairman said are true, that it is important to have basic science research, it is important to have the programs that NSF supports and that NASA supports, it is also true that it is critical that we maintain the contract that we have with the veterans in this country. The reason that we have the freedoms to have basic science research in this country is because of the sacrifices that our veterans have made serving this country. I have 114,000 veterans in southern Nevada just in my district alone. Many of those veterans have to travel 4 rac{1}{2} hours to southern California because there is not adequate funding levels at the hospital in Las Vegas to take care of their basic needs. Therefore, they have to travel all the way to southern California. I think this is a travesty to those people who have sacrificed so much, have had very little pay while they are in the service, spent a lot of time away from their families, a lot of them sacrificed limbs, a lot of them sacrificed a lot of their friends, people that they knew in battle, and to me and to a lot of the Members of this Congress, I think it is important that we maintain the contract that we have had with these veterans over the years.”